Chroma Information Signaling for Video Streams

ABSTRACT

Embodiments of systems and methods for signaling chroma information for a picture in a compressed video stream are provided. One system embodiment, among others, comprises a memory with logic, and a processor configured with the logic to provide a compressed video stream that includes a picture having chroma samples and luma samples, and provide in the compressed video stream a flag for signaling information corresponding to the location of the chroma samples in relation to the luma samples in the picture, wherein a first defined flag value indicates default locations of the chroma samples in relation to the luma samples in the picture, wherein a second defined flag value indicates a presence in the compressed video stream of auxiliary chroma information corresponding to relative locations of the chroma samples to the luma samples in the picture, and wherein the number of chroma samples in the picture implied by the first defined flag value is equal to the number of chroma samples in the picture implied by the second defined flag value. Other embodiments for signaling chroma information for a picture in a compressed video stream are included herein.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of U.S. Utility application entitled,“METHODS AND SYSTEMS FOR SIGNALING CHROMA INFORMATION IN VIDEO” havingSer. No. 11/532,415, filed Sep. 15, 2006 (issued U.S. Pat. No. 8,442,124on May 14, 2013), which is a continuation of U.S. Utility applicationentitled, “CHROMA CONVERSION OPTIMIZATION,” having Ser. No. 10/266,825,filed Oct. 8, 2002 (issued U.S. Pat. No. 7,136,417 on Nov. 14, 2006),which claims priority to U.S. provisional application No. 60/395,969,filed Jul. 15, 2002, all of which are entirely incorporated herein byreference.

TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention is generally related tocompression technology, and, more particularly, is related to chromaprocessing in subscriber television systems. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

In implementing enhanced programming in subscriber television systems,the home communication terminal (“HCT”), otherwise known as the set-topbox, has become an important computing device for accessing mediacontent services (and media content within those services) andnavigating a user through a maze of available services. In addition tosupporting traditional analog broadcast video functionality, digitalHCTs (or “DHCTs”) now also support an increasing number of two-waydigital services such as video-on-demand and personal video recording(PVR).

Typically, a DHCT is connected to a cable or satellite, or generally, asubscriber television system, and includes hardware and softwarenecessary to provide the functionality of the digital television systemat the user's site. Some of the software executed by a DHCT may bedownloaded and/or updated via the subscriber television system. EachDHCT also typically includes a processor, communication components, andmemory, and is connected to a television or other display device, suchas a personal computer. While many conventional DHCTs are stand-alonedevices that are externally connected to a television, a DHCT and/or itsfunctionality may be integrated into a television or personal computeror even an audio device such as a programmable radio, as will beappreciated by those of ordinary skill in the art.

One of the features of the DHCT includes reception of a digital videosignal as a compressed video signal. Another feature of the DHCTincludes providing PVR functionality through the use of a storage devicecoupled to the DHCT. When providing this PVR functionality for analogtransmission signals, compression is often employed after digitizationto reduce the quantity or rate of data, and thus conserve data storagerequirements for media content stored in the storage device. Videocompression accomplishes this data reduction by exploiting dataredundancy in a video sequence (i.e., a sequence of digitized pictures).There are two types of redundancies exploited in a video sequence,namely, spatial and temporal, as is the case in existing video codingstandards. A description of some of these standards can be found in thefollowing publications, which are hereby incorporated herein byreference: (1) ISO/IEC International Standard IS 11172-2, “Informationtechnology—Coding of moving pictures and associated audio for digitalstorage media at up to about 1.5 Mbits/s—Part 2: video,” 1993; (2) ITU-TRecommendation H-262 (1996): “Generic coding of moving pictures andassociated audio information: Video,” (ISO/IEC 13818-2); (3) ITU-TRecommendation H.261 (1993): “Video codec for audiovisual services atp×64 kbits/s”; and (4) Draft ITU-T Recommendation H.263 (1995): “Videocodec for low bitrate communications.”

One aspect of video signal digitization reduces the data rate of a videosignal by performing downconversion of the color information of thevideo signal. The human eye has less spatial acuity to the colorinformation than to the luminance (brightness) information. A videopicture is transmitted with a brightness component (luminance) and twocolor components (chrominance). The digital representation of a videosignal includes a luma signal (Y), representative of brightness, andcolor difference (or chroma) signals Cb (blue—Y) and Cr (red—Y). Withoutloss of generality to the specification of a video signal, luminance andluma are used interchangeably in this description as well as chrominanceand chroma. The luminance information is often subjected to a non-lineartransfer function, such as by a camera, and this process is called gammacorrection.

Color formats for these three digitized channels of information, orequivalently the digitized YCbCr video signals, can include severalforms to effect a spatial downsampling (or subsampling) of the chroma.These color formats include 4:4:4, 4:2:2, and 4:2:0, as described inITU-601, which is an international standard for component digitaltelevision that was derived from the SMPTE (Society of Motion Pictureand Television Engineers) RP1 25 and EBU 3246E standards and which areherein incorporated by reference. ITU-601 defines the sampling systems,matrix values, and filter characteristics for Y, Cb, Cr andred-green-blue (RGB) component digital television. ITU-601 establishes a4:2:2 sampling scheme at 13.5 MHz for the Y signal and 6.75 MHz for theCbCr signals with eight-bit digitizing for each channel. Certainimplementations may process each channel internally with a higherprecision than eight bits. These sample frequencies were chosen becausethey work for both 525-line 60 Hz and 625-line 50 Hz component videosystems. The term 4:2:2 generally refers to the ratio of the number of Ysignal samples to the number of CbCr signal samples in the schemeestablished by ITU-601. For every four Y samples, the CbCr signals areeach sampled twice. On a pixel basis, this can be restated as for everypixel pair, there is a sample Y₁, Y₂, and a CbCr shared among the twoluma samples. Equal sampling (i.e., Y₁CbCr, Y₂CbCr) at, say 4:4:4, issimply not required for most subscriber television systems due to thereduced visual acuity for color information. Consequently, the 4:2:2format is an industry standard for input from a digitizer such as ananalog video signal decoder and for output to an analog video signalencoder that drives a television display.

MPEG-2 (Motion Pictures Expert Group) main profile uses 4:2:0 colorformatting, which reduces transmission bandwidth and data storagerequirements, since now for every four luma samples, the CbCr signalsare each sampled once. According to ITU-601, the first number of the4:2:0 color format (i.e., “4”) historically represents approximately “4”times the sampling rate for a video signal. The second number (i.e.,“2”) represents a defined horizontal subsampling with respect to theluma samples. The third number (e.g., “0”) represents a defined verticalsubsampling (e.g., 2:1 vertical subsampling).

Thus, in the process of digitizing a video signal, the DHCT downconvertsthe CbCr signal components (or chroma) from the 4:2:2 color format tothe 4:2:0 color format using filtering technology well-known in the artto comply to the format required for compression, which also reducesdata storage consumption in the storage device. Likewise, a remotecompression engine (i.e., remote from the DHCT) may likely have toperform downconversion from the 4:2:2 color format to the 4:2:0 colorformat using filtering technology. In transitioning from a 4:2:2 colorformat to a 4:2:0 color format, the chroma signal has to represent alarger pixel sampling area.

Displaying the video pictures on a display device includes the processof receiving a transmitted digital video signal or the process ofretrieving the pictures of the video signal from the storage device,decompressing the resultant video signal and reconstructing the picturesin memory, and upconverting the CbCr signal components (or chroma) fromthe 4:2:0 color format to the 4:2:2 or 4:4:4 color format for eventualdisplay to a display device, or for other processing. Thus, conversionagain is needed to reconstruct the color information of the originalsignal, a process that often reduces picture quality. What is needed isa system that reduces the loss of picture quality (or preserves thepicture quality) in the conversion of the chroma.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The preferred embodiments of the invention can be better understood withreference to the following drawings. The components in the drawings arenot necessarily to scale, emphasis instead being placed upon clearlyillustrating the principles of the present invention. Moreover, in thedrawings, like reference numerals designate corresponding partsthroughout the several views. FIG. 1 is a high-level block diagramdepicting an example subscriber television system, in accordance withone embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of an example digital home communicationterminal (DHCT) as depicted in FIG. 1 and related equipment, inaccordance with one embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 3A is a schematic diagram that represents the hierarchy of a MotionPictures Expert Group (MPEG) video stream as output by a compressionengine and received by a decompression engine, with the highest layershown at the bottom and the lowest layers shown at the top, inaccordance with one embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 3B is a schematic diagram that illustrates a default spatialarrangement of 4:2:0 luma and chroma samples for progressive framepictures, in accordance with one embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 3C is a schematic diagram that illustrates a default spatialarrangement of 4:2:0 luma and chroma samples for interlaced framepictures, in accordance with one embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 4A is a parameter set used to designate chroma locations inprogressive and interlaced frame pictures, in accordance with oneembodiment of the invention.

FIG. 4B is a schematic diagram of two optional chroma offsets forprogressive pictures such as those shown in FIG. 3B, in accordance withone embodiment of the invention.

FIGS. 4C-4D are schematic diagrams of optional chroma offsets forinterlaced frame pictures such as those shown in FIG. 3C, in accordancewith one embodiment of the invention.

FIGS. 5-8 are flow diagrams that illustrate example methods ofcommunication of filter or chroma information from a downconverter of acompression engine to an upconverter of a decompression engine, inaccordance with several embodiments of the invention.

FIGS. 9A-9F are timing diagrams that illustrate several embodiments forthe transfer of the filter or chroma information via the communicationmethods illustrated in FIGS. 5-8 from the downconverter of thecompression engine to the upconverter of the decompression engine, inaccordance with several embodiments of the invention.

FIG. 10 is a timing diagram that illustrates an embodiment for thetransfer of chroma information, in accordance with one embodiment of theinvention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

The preferred embodiments of the present invention now will be describedmore fully hereinafter with reference to the accompanying drawings, inwhich preferred embodiments of the present invention are shown. Thepreferred embodiments of the present invention can generally bedescribed as including systems and methods that employ up-conversionfilters at an upconverter of a decompression engine during upconversionthat are optimized to complement (i.e., provide the inverse filterfunction) the filtering operation performed on the chroma (i.e., thechroma signal components) during the downconversion at a downconverterof a compression engine. The downconversion can be achieved at a digitalhome communication terminal (DHCT) or remotely, for example at aheadend. This optimization can reduce degradation attributed tomismatched interpolation of the chroma in the picture. The YCbCr 4:2:2color format is the predominant interface and format used for digitizedvideo. It is output by analog video decoders and input by analog videoencoders for display.

Most video compression standards such as ISO MPEG-2, ITU H.261 or ITUH.263, however, specify compression of pictures in the YCbCr 4:2:0 colorformat resulting in downconversion of the chroma to the YCbCr 4:2:0color format for compression. A decompression engine receives acompressed video stream at its input, then decompresses and reconstructspictures in memory in the YCbCr 4:2:0 color format. For display, anupconverter of the decompression engine up-converts the reconstructedYCbCr 4:2:0 pictures to the YCbCr 4:2:2 color format. The ITU-656standard pertains to digitized interlaced video fields specified inYCbCr 4:2:2 color formats. Similar to YCbCr 4:2:2, alternate digitizedvideo formats stem from YCbCr 4:2:2 or require “multicolor channel”information on every line of the picture for display and thus require aninterim 4:2:2 or 4:4:4 up-conversion step.

In some instances, a compression engine receives a YCbCr 4:2:2 at itsinput and employs a YCbCr 4:2:2 to 4:2:0 downconversion filter accordingto algorithmic preferences and compression goals of the compressionengine. A compression engine may further receive progressive pictures orinterlaced pictures at its input. When receiving interlaced pictures,the compression engine may employ detection of field replication withwhat is called inverse telecine detection to detect that the interlacedpicture was actually from a progressive camera or scanned from film, andmay opt to compress the video signal as a progressive picture.Currently, a decompression engine has no information of which filterswere employed by a compression engine for downconversion and mustup-convert from the YCbCr 4:2:0 color format to the 4:2:2 color formatfor display or other processing using a non-optimized general filter.For instance, the filters employed by compression engines from differentmanufacturers differ due to different strategies of noise reductionand/or chroma downconversion. A compression engine manufacturer may optto coalesce chroma downconversion and noise reduction filtering.Furthermore, because a picture may be either progressive or interlaceoriginally, depending on the camera, and because a picture may have beentransmitted or stored in an alternate form to the scan format producedby the camera, filtering for chroma downconversion may be different. Thepreferred embodiments of the invention include mechanisms that enablethe compression engine to communicate which filters were employed fordownconversion (or which filters to employ for upconversion based on thefilters used for downconversion), thus addressing some of theaforementioned problems in implementing upconversion.

In other instances, a compression engine is presented with digitized4:2:0 formatted pictures to compress with a specific chroma samplelocation relative to the luma samples. Thus, the compression engine doesnot have to perform downconversion of chroma samples from 4:2:2. Thiswould be the case, for example, when performing a transcode operationfrom a first compressed video stream format to a second compressed videostream format. For example, a decompression engine is capable ofdecoding a first compressed video stream format and presentsdecompressed and reconstructed digitized pictures to the input of acompression engine for compression. To avoid any further degradation ofthe chroma, the compression engine forgoes downconversion of the chroma(according to a second compressed video stream format) and retains theoriginal specification of chroma displacement relative to luma samples(of the first compressed video stream format). The retainedspecification is signaled in the compressed video stream with a chromaposition flag.

The preferred embodiments of the invention also include systems andmethods to inform the decompression engine (or rather, the upconverterof the decompression engine) of chroma information such as chromaoffsets relative to luma samples or of which filters were used by thecompression engine (or rather, the downconverter of the compressionengine) for downconversion of the chroma using a new field in the groupof pictures (GOP) header, sequence header, and/or picture header, forexample as an extension header. As a result, the upconverter of thedecompression engine employs upconversion filters for chroma informationthat are tailored for the specified position of the chroma samplesrelative to luma samples, or optimized to match the complement of thedownconversion filters used to perform the downconversion by the videocompression engine, and/or to match the scan format for the displaydevice it is driving, either progressive or interlace, for example, suchthat degradation attributed to chroma information interpolation in thepicture is reduced.

For example, a 4:2:0 color format not only specifies fewer chromasamples than a 4:2:2 color format, but also chroma samples that may ormay not be co-located with any of the chroma samples in the 4:2:2 colorformat required for, say, display. Consequently, the chroma offsetassists in specifying the actual location of the chroma samples in the4:2:0 color format in compressed video pictures. Assuming “normal”picture reconstruction and “normal” display, a first compressed videostream may comprise chroma samples in a 4:2:0 color format that areco-located with half of the chroma samples of the 4:2:2 color formatrequired for display. In such a case, the decompressed chroma samplesmay be employed as half of the chroma samples in the 4:2:2 color formatrequired for display. In a second compressed video stream, none of thechroma samples in the 4:2:0 color format are co-located with the chromasamples in the 4:2:2 color format required for display.

In one embodiment, a table specifies a suite of filter sets, each setwith a respective number of filters and each with a respective number oftaps and tap values. The set of filters can be standardized in a videocompression standard such as H.26L, for example, so that a simple token(e.g., a field including a small finite number of bits) in thecompressed video stream can notify the decompression engine which in thepredefined set of filters to use in the upconversion of chroma.Alternatively, the table can be transmitted as part of the header of thepicture sequence level, as a sequence extension, in the (GOP) layer, aspart of the picture header or picture coding extension, as part ofpicture display extension, as part of the slice layer, as MPEG-2 privatedata, and/or as user data. In one embodiment, the table can betransmitted exclusively in one of the aforementioned levels or layers ofthe compressed video stream. In an alternate embodiment, the table istransmitted in one or more of the levels and layers of the stream. Anelement specified to carry data or a parameter set can serve as avehicle to carry the chroma information or in general, sufficientinformation required for a decompression engine to implement anoptimized chroma upconversion operation, and thus a table is not alimitation of the preferred embodiments, nor is the specification of oneor more filters. That is, in one embodiment, sufficient chromainformation may merely include the location of the chroma samplesrelative to the luma samples in the picture. The upconverter implementsupconversion filters for the specified chroma information. Preferably,the table includes, not the filters employed by the downconverter, butthose filters that are to be used by the upconverter for chromaupconversion or the chroma offsets implied by the filters. Otherembodiments will be described below, including a table that includesfilters employed by the downconverter.

In one embodiment, according to the downconversion filters it employs, adownconverter specifies an upconversion filter for chroma upconversionfor odd fields and an upconversion filter, that may or may not be thesame upconversion filter used for the odd fields, for even fields to beused by the upconverter in a finite size field in a header. Theupconverter thus has a table of filters for chroma upconversion at itsdisposition. A compressed video stream can specify in a finite sizefield the index into the table for the filter to be used for the oddfields and the index for the filter to be used for the even fields toupconvert the chroma. Alternatively, a single index may specify bothfilters. The downconverter specifies upconversion filters that areoptimized to complement the filters used in the downconversion of thechroma information. Alternatively, the downconverter specifies thechroma offsets implied by the upconversion filters that are optimized tocomplement the filtering involved in the downconversion of the chroma.

When downconversion filtering is employed and the compressed videostream carries chroma offset information, the specified chroma offsetimplies the upconversion filter(s) to be employed by the upconverter.The implied upconversion filtering by the chroma offset is intended for“normal” picture reconstruction and “normal” display. If thedecompressed picture is displayed at a different picture size than thecompressed picture size, then the upconverter uses the chroma offsetinformation in the process of simultaneously resizing and upconvertingto a 4:2:2 color format for the decompressed pictures. Thus, the impliedupconversion filter by the chroma offset may differ when resizing thedecompressed picture. For instance, a compressed video stream maycomprise of standard pictures that need to be upscaled in size fordisplay in a high definition TV (HDTV).

If the decompressed picture is displayed in a different display devicethan the inherent compressed picture type, then the upconverter uses thechroma offset information in the process of simultaneous picture typeconversion and upconverting to a 4:2:2 color format for the decompressedpictures. For instance, when the compressed picture is an interlacedpicture but the display device is a progressive display device, theinterlaced pictures will be converted to progressive pictures fordisplay. Note that when a chroma offset is specified, it will beunderstood that one chroma offset may be specified for top fields thatmay or may not be different than the chroma offset specified for thebottom fields.

In other embodiments, the chroma offsets relative to the luma samplesare specified regardless of which downconversion filters were employedto generate the 4:2:0 downconversion and regardless of whetherdownconversion from 4:2:2 to 4:2:0 was performed at all. For instance,downconversion to 4:2:0 may not be performed at all when the digitizedvideo signal presented at the input of the compression engine is alreadyin 4:2:0 format. A digitized video signal may already be in a 4:2:0color format for any of multiple reasons, such as for a transcodingoperation, as explained further below.

Downconversion (also known as subsampling or downsampling) will hereinbe used to refer to, among other things, the change in color format in avideo signal from a first color format to a second color format in whichthe number of chroma samples relative to luma samples in the first colorformat is higher than in the second color format. Similarly,upconversion (also known as upsampling) will herein be used to refer to,among other things, the change in color format in a video signal from afirst color format to a second color format in which the number ofchroma samples relative to luma samples in the second color format ishigher than in the first color format.

FIGS. 1-2 will provide an overview of an example system in whichdownconversion and upconversion can be implemented. FIG. 3A will providean illustration of a hierarchical structure for an MPEG-2 video signal,with the default chroma sample locations further delineated in FIGS. 3Band 3C, and optional locations for the chroma samples shown in FIGS.4B-4D. FIG. 4A shows one example mechanism to designate chroma samplelocations. FIGS. 5-8 will illustrate several methods for communicatingfilter or chroma information from the downconverter to the upconverter,and FIGS. 9A-9F and FIG. 10 will provide illustrations of what thefilter or chroma information includes in different implementations. Thepreferred embodiments of the present invention may, however, be embodiedin many different forms and should not be construed as limited to theembodiments set forth herein; rather, these embodiments are provided sothat this disclosure will be thorough and complete, and will fullyconvey the scope of the invention to those having ordinary skill in theart. Furthermore, all “examples” given herein are intended to benon-limiting, and are provided as an exemplary list among other examplescontemplated but not shown.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram that depicts an example subscriber televisionsystem (STS) 100. In this example, the STS 100 includes a headend 110and a DHCT 200 that are coupled via a network 130. The DHCT 200 istypically situated at a user's residence or place of business and may bea stand-alone unit or integrated into another device such as, forexample, a display device 140 or a personal computer (not shown), amongother devices. The DHCT 200 receives signals (video, audio and/or otherdata) including, for example, digital video signals in a compressedrepresentation of a digitized video signal such as compressed MPEG-2streams modulated on a carrier signal, and/or analog informationmodulated on a carrier signal, among others, from the headend 110through the network 130, and provides reverse information to the headend110 through the network 130.

The network 130 may include any suitable medium for communicatingtelevision services data including, for example, a cable televisionnetwork or a satellite television network, among others. The headend 110may include one or more server devices (not shown) for providing video,audio, and textual data to client devices such as the DHCT 200. Theheadend 110 and the DHCT 200 cooperate to provide a user with televisionservices including, for example, television programs, an interactiveprogram guide (IPG), and/or video-on-demand (VOD) presentations, amongothers. The television services are presented via the display device140, which is typically a television set that, according to its type, isdriven with an interlaced scan video signal or a progressive scan videosignal. However, the display device 140 may also be any other devicecapable of displaying video images including, for example, a computermonitor. Further note that although shown communicating with a displaydevice 140, the DHCT 200 can communicate with other devices that receiveand store and/or process the signals from the DHCT 200.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram that illustrates selected components of a DHCT200, in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention. It willbe understood that the DHCT 200 shown in FIG. 2 is merely illustrativeand should not be construed as implying any limitations upon the scopeof the invention. For example, in another embodiment, the DHCT 200 mayhave fewer, additional, and/or different components than the componentsillustrated in FIG. 2. A DHCT 200 is typically situated at a user'sresidence or place of business and may be a stand alone unit orintegrated into another device such as, for example, a television set ora personal computer. The DHCT 200 preferably includes a communicationsinterface 242 for receiving signals (video, audio and/or other data)from the headend 110 (FIG. 1) through the network 130 (FIG. 1), andprovides reverse information to the headend 110.

The DHCT 200 further preferably includes at least one processor 244 forcontrolling operations of the DHCT 200, an output system 248 for drivingthe television display 140 (FIG. 1), and a tuner system 245 for tuningto a particular television channel and/or frequency and for sending andreceiving various types of data to/from the headend 110 (FIG. 1). TheDHCT 200 may include, in other embodiments, multiple tuners forreceiving downloaded (or transmitted) data. The tuner system 245 canselect from a plurality of transmission signals provided by thesubscriber television system 100 (FIG. 1). The tuner system 245 enablesthe DHCT 200 to tune to downstream media and data transmissions, therebyallowing a user to receive digital and/or analog media content via thesubscriber television system 100. The tuner system 245 includes, in oneimplementation, an out-of-band tuner for bi-directional quadrature phaseshift keying (QPSK) data communication and one or more quadratureamplitude modulation (QAM) tuners (in band) for receiving televisionsignals. Additionally, a receiver 246 receives externally-generated userinputs or commands from an input device such as, for example, a remotecontrol device (not shown).

The DHCT 200 may include one or more wireless or wired interfaces, alsocalled communication ports 274, for receiving and/or transmitting datato other devices. For instance, the DHCT 200 may feature USB (UniversalSerial Bus), Ethernet, IEEE-1394, serial, and/or parallel ports, etc.The DHCT 200 may also include an analog video input port for receivinganalog video signals. User input may be provided via an input devicesuch as, for example, a hand-held remote control device or a keyboard.

The DHCT 200 includes a signal processing system 214, which comprises ademodulating system 210 and a transport demultiplexing and parsingsystem 215 (herein demultiplexing system) for processing broadcast mediacontent and/or data. One or more of the components of the signalprocessing system 214 can be implemented with software, a combination ofsoftware and hardware, or preferably in hardware. The demodulatingsystem 210 comprises functionality for demodulating analog or digitaltransmission signals. For instance, the demodulating system 210 candemodulate a digital transmission signal in a carrier frequency that wasmodulated, among others, as a QAM-modulated signal. When tuned to acarrier frequency corresponding to an analog TV signal, thedemultiplexing system 215 is bypassed and the demodulated analog TVsignal that is output by the demodulating system 210 is instead routedto an analog video decoder 216. The analog TV signal can be presented tothe input of the analog video decoder 216, in one implementation, as anon-compressed video signal having a 4:2:2 color format. The analogvideo decoder 216 converts the analog TV signal into a sequence ofdigitized pictures in interlaced scan format and their respectivedigitized audio. Digitized pictures and respective audio output by theanalog video decoder 216 are presented at the input of a compressionengine 217.

The compression engine 217 processes the sequence of digitized picturesand digitized audio and converts them into compressed video and audiostreams, respectively. The compression engine 217 preferably includes anITU-656 port that accepts digitized non-compressed signals in the 4:2:2color format. The compression engine 217 includes a pre-processor 213that provides for low pass filter functionality and scalingfunctionality, as well as other components and/or functionality that areemployed to reduce the effects of noise, film grain, aliasing, and/orother artifacts that can degrade picture quality. The pre-processor 213also includes a downconverter 212.

The downconverter 212 employs one or more filters to performdownconversion of the chroma signal components (Cb and Cr) (or chroma)from the 4:2:2 color format to the 4:2:0 color format. The filters aregenerally characterized by the number of taps (i.e., coefficients), tapvalues, indications of whether the filter or filters are to be appliedto the top or bottom field of an interlaced frame, and the bit rate. Thefilters may be designed to enforce a certain phase-shift (e.g., offset)in the chroma information in one type of field and a differentphase-shift in the opposite field. For instance, a quarter pixelphase-shift may be imposed in the top field toward the top direction anda quarter pixel phase-shift may be imposed in the bottom field towardthe bottom direction. Alternatively, no phase-shift may be imposed atall. In one embodiment, upon detection of a picture that was originallyprogressive rather than interlaced (e.g., via inverse telecinedetection), different filters are applied. Note that a chromaphase-shift is equivalent to an offset of the location of the chromasample in the spatial domain of the picture relative to the location ofthe luma samples. For example, a chroma sample located at the midwaypoint between the center of two vertically-aligned luma samples is saidto have a phase-shift, or offset, of 0.5 pixels in the verticalorientation with respect to the luma samples.

In one implementation, a suite of filters (not shown) can be maintainedin memory 249, such as DRAM 252 or FLASH memory 251, or preferably incompression engine memory 298, which is preferably dedicated to thecompression engine 217, that is either externally coupled to thecompression engine 217 (as shown) or integrated within the compressionengine 217 in other embodiments. The suite of filters are preferablystored in a data structure such as a data table. The filters can also bestored in a storage device 273 in other embodiments. Further, in apreferred embodiment, complement filters that are characterized as beingan inverse function of the filters employed by the downconverter 212 canbe maintained in memory 249, for use by an upconverter 227 of adecompression engine 222 when implementing upconversion of the 4:2:0color formatted signal to a 4:2:2 color format for display, as oneexample, as will be described below. Preferably, the complement filtersare stored in a data structure in a decompression engine memory 299,which is dedicated to the decompression engine 222, that is eitherexternally coupled to the decompression engine 222 (as shown) orintegrated within the decompression engine 222 in other embodiments, andin yet other embodiments can be stored in memory 249. Note that thedecompression engine memory 299 is also used for digital compressedstreams received from the headend 11.

The compressed video and audio streams are produced in accordance withthe syntax and semantics of a designated audio and video coding method,such as, for example, MPEG-2, so that they can be interpreted by thedecompression engine 222 for decompression, upconversion, andreconstruction at a future time. Each compressed stream consists of asequence of data packets containing a header and a payload. Each headercontains a unique packet identification code, or PID, associated withthe respective compressed stream.

The compression engine 217 multiplexes the audio and video compressedstreams into a transport stream, such as an MPEG-2 transport stream.Furthermore, compression engine 217 can preferably compress audio andvideo corresponding to more than one program in parallel (e.g., twotuned analog TV signals when DHCT 200 has multiple tuners) and tomultiplex the respective audio and video compressed streams into asingle transport stream. The output of compressed streams and/ortransport streams produced by the compression engine 217 is input to asignal processing system 214. Parsing capabilities of the demultiplexingsystem 215 allow for interpretation of sequence and picture headers, andin a preferred embodiment, annotating their locations within theirrespective compressed stream as well as other useful information forfuture retrieval from storage device 273, as described below. Acompressed analog video stream (e.g., corresponding to a TV programepisode or show) that is received via a tuned analog transmissionchannel can be output as a transport stream by the signal processingsystem 214 and presented as input for storage in the storage device 273via interface 275. The packetized compressed streams can be also outputby the signal processing system 214 and presented as input to thedecompression engine 222.

The decompression engine 222 includes a video decompressor 223 and anaudio decompressor 225 for video and audio decompression, respectively.The decompression engine 222 also includes an upconverter 227 to provideupconversion of the chroma of the video signal from the 4:2:0 colorformat to the 4:2:2 color format. The upconverter 227 is preferablylocated in the display pipeline, the display portion, or thepost-processing stage of the decompression engine 222, and is preferablyimplemented as a state machine. In other embodiments, the upconverter227 can operate in cooperation with a processor or a digital signalprocessor (DSP) (not shown) that is integrated in the decompressionengine 222. The upconverter 227 employs one or more upconversion filtersfor performing the upconversion from the 4:2:0 color format to the 4:2:2color format. The decompression engine 222 also includes a digitalencoder (DENC) 226, that provides an analog signal from the digital,non-compressed 4:2:2 video signal received from the upconverter 227 to adisplay device 140 (FIG. 1).

The demultiplexing system 215 can include MPEG-2 transportdemultiplexing. When tuned to carrier frequencies carrying a digitaltransmission signal, the demultiplexing system 215 enables theseparation of packets of data, corresponding to the desired videostreams, for further processing. Concurrently, the demultiplexing system215 precludes further processing of packets in the multiplexed transportstream that are irrelevant or not desired, such as packets of datacorresponding to other video streams.

The components of the signal processing system 214 are preferablycapable of QAM demodulation, forward error correction, demultiplexing ofMPEG-2 transport streams, and parsing of packetized elementary streamsand elementary streams. The signal processing system 214 furthercommunicates with the processor 244 via interrupt and messagingcapabilities of the DHCT 200. The processor 244 annotates the locationof pictures within the compressed stream as well as other pertinentinformation. The annotations by the processor 244 enable normal playbackor other playback modes of the stored compressed stream of therespective compressed stream.

A compressed video stream corresponding to a tuned carrier frequencycarrying a digital transmission signal can be output as a transportstream by the signal processing system 214 and presented as input forstorage in the storage device 273 via interface 275. In one embodiment,the compressed video stream comprises information to inform thedecompression engine which set of filters or offsets to use in theupconversion of the chroma. The packetized compressed streams can bealso output by the signal processing system 214 and presented as inputto the decompression engine 222 for audio and/or video decompression.

One having ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that the signalprocessing system 214 may include other components not shown, includingmemory, decryptors, samplers, digitizers (e.g., analog-to-digitalconverters), and multiplexers, among others. Further, other embodimentswill be understood, by those having ordinary skill in the art, to bewithin the scope of the preferred embodiments of the present invention.For example, analog signals (e.g., NTSC) may bypass one or more elementsof the signal processing system 214 and may be forwarded directly to theoutput system 248. Outputs presented at corresponding next-stage inputsfor the aforementioned signal processing flow may be connected viaaccessible DRAM 252 in which an outputting device stores the output dataand from which an inputting device retrieves it. Outputting andinputting devices may include the analog video decoder 216, thecompression engine 217, the decompression engine 222, the signalprocessing system 214, and components or sub-components thereof.

The demultiplexing system 215 parses (i.e., reads and interprets)compressed streams to interpret sequence headers and picture headers,and deposits a transport stream carrying compressed streams into DRAM252. The processor 244 causes the transport stream to be transferredfrom DRAM 252 to the storage device 273 via interface 275. Uponeffecting the demultiplexing and parsing of the transport streamcarrying one or more video streams, the processor 244 interprets thedata output by the signal processing system 214 and generates ancillarydata in the form of a table or data structure (index table 202)comprising the relative or absolute location of the beginning of certainpictures in the compressed video stream. Such ancillary data is used tofacilitate the retrieval of desired video data during future operations.

In one embodiment of the invention, a plurality of tuners and respectivedemodulating systems 213, demultiplexing systems 215, and signalprocessing systems 214 may simultaneously receive and process aplurality of respective broadcast digital video streams. Alternatively,a single demodulating system 213, a single demultiplexing system 215,and a single signal processing system 214, each with sufficientprocessing capabilities, may be used to process a plurality of digitalvideo streams.

In yet another embodiment, a first tuner in tuning system 245 receivesan analog video signal corresponding to a first video stream and asecond tuner simultaneously receives a digital compressed streamcorresponding to a second video stream. The first video stream isconverted into a digital format. The second video stream and/or acompressed digital version of the first video stream are routed to ahard disk 201 of the storage device 273. Data annotations for the twostreams are performed to facilitate future retrieval of the videostreams from the storage device 273. The first video stream and/or thesecond video stream may also be routed to decompression engine 222 fordecompression, upconversion, and reconstruction, and subsequentpresentation via the display device 140 (FIG. 1). The first video streammay be routed to the decompression engine 222 in either a digital oranalog format.

In one implementation, the compression engine 217 can output formattedMPEG-2 or MPEG-1 packetized elementary streams (PES) inside a transportstream, all compliant to the syntax and semantics of the ISO MPEG-2standard. Alternatively, the compression engine 217 can output otherdigital formats that are compliant to other standards. The digitalcompressed streams output by the compression engine 217 corresponding toa video stream are routed to the demultiplexing system 215. Thedemultiplexing system 215 parses (i.e., reads and interprets) thetransport stream generated by the compression engine 217 withoutdisturbing its content and deposits the transport stream into DRAM 252.The processor 244 causes the transport stream in DRAM 252 to betransferred to the storage device 273. In a preferred embodiment, whileparsing the transport stream, the demultiplexing system 215 outputs toDRAM 252 ancillary data in the form of a table or data structurecomprising the relative or absolute location of the beginning of certainpictures in the compressed media content stream for the video stream forfacilitating retrieval during future operations. In this way, randomaccess operations such as fast forward, rewind, and jumping to alocation in the compressed video stream can be achieved. Additionalpertinent data is also written in the tables, as described below.

In some embodiments, a plurality of compression engines 217 may be usedto simultaneously compress a plurality of analog video streams.Alternatively, a single compression engine 217 with sufficientprocessing capabilities may be used to compress a plurality of digitizedanalog video signals presented at its input. Compressed digital versionsof respective analog video streams may be routed to the hard disk 201 ofthe storage device 273. Data annotations for each of the video streamsmay be performed to facilitate future retrieval of the video streamsfrom the storage device 273. Depending on requirements in effect at aninstance of time, only a subset of the total number of compresseddigital video signals may be routed to the storage device 273. Any ofthe received video streams can also be routed simultaneously to thedecompression engine 222 for decoding, encoding, and subsequentpresentation via the display device 140 (FIG. 1).

In one embodiment, the compression engine 217 records filter informationfor upconversion of the chroma in respective data annotations for eachvideo stream. In this way, in a self-contained system wherein thecompression engine 217 and the decompression engine 222 co-exist (suchas where both components are resident in the DHCT 200), and thedecompression engine 222 is the sole consumer of compressed videostreams produced by the compression engine 217, the data annotationsallow the decompression engine 222 to decompress and display optimizedpicture quality for respective compressed video streams. Thedecompression engine 222 is programmed to employ corresponding filtersfor upconversion of the chroma when sourcing a compressed video streamproduced by the compression engine 217.

When sourcing other compressed video streams, such as those receivedfrom a tuned digital channel where the stream was compressed externallyto the DHCT 200, the decompression engine 222 has no specific knowledgeof how the downconversion of the chroma was performed and thus proceeds,in one embodiment, to perform ordinary chroma upconversion according toa chroma specification (that can be optionally followed) withoutauxiliary chroma upconversion information.

The DHCT 200 includes at least one storage device 273 for storing videostreams received by the DHCT 200. A PVR application 277, in cooperationwith the operating system 253 and the device driver 211, effects, amongother functions, read and/or write operations to/from the storage device273. Herein, references to write and/or read operations to the storagedevice 273 will be understood to include operations to the medium ormedia of the storage device 273 unless indicated otherwise. The devicedriver 211 is a software module preferably resident in the operatingsystem 253. The device driver 211, under management of the operatingsystem 253, communicates with the storage device controller 279 toprovide the operating instructions for the storage device 273. Asconventional device drivers and device controllers are well known tothose of ordinary skill in the art, further discussion of the detailedworking of each will not be described further here.

The storage device 273 is preferably internal to the DHCT 200, coupledto a common bus 205 through a communication interface 275. Thecommunication interface 275 is preferably an integrated driveelectronics (IDE) or small computer system interface (SCSI), althoughanother interface such as, for example, IEEE-1394 or universal serialbus (USB), among others, may be used. Alternatively, the storage device273 can be externally connected to the DHCT 200 via a communication port274. The communication port 274 may be, for example, an IEEE-1394, aUSB, a SCSI, or an IDE. In one implementation, video streams arereceived in the DHCT 200 via communications interface 242 and stored ina temporary memory cache (not shown). The temporary memory cache may bea designated section of DRAM 252 or an independent memory attacheddirectly to a communication interface 242. The temporary cache isimplemented and managed to enable media content transfers to the storagedevice 273. In one implementation, the fast access time and high datatransfer rate characteristics of the storage device 273 enable mediacontent to be read from the temporary cache and written to the storagedevice 273 in a sufficiently fast manner. Multiple simultaneous datatransfer operations may be implemented so that while data is beingtransferred from the temporary cache to the storage device 273,additional data may be received and stored in the temporary cache.

FIG. 3A is a schematic diagram that represents the hierarchy of theelements in an MPEG-2 video stream as output by the compression engine217 (FIG. 2), with the highest layer shown at the bottom and the lowestlayers shown at the top. It will be understood that this is one examplehierarchy, and that others that are specified according to the syntaxand semantics of the employed codec definition, such as MPEG-4, H.26L,etc., are contemplated to be within the scope of the preferredembodiments of the invention. A sequence of pictures 310 will comprise asequence layer 320, with the sequence layer comprising groups ofpictures. Further delineating the next level of the hierarchy of theelements in an MPEG-2 video stream is the group of pictures (GOP) layer330, which includes a series of pictures. Each picture can further bebroken sown as a picture layer 340 that includes a series of slices,which in turn leads to the next higher layer (the slice layer 350) whichincludes a series of macroblocks. The macroblocks comprise a macroblocklayer 360 that includes, among other elements, luma and chroma blocks. Asimilar hierarchy of layers exist for other video compressionmethodologies such as MPEG-4 video and H.26L video (currently in draftform and likely to be named H.264).

The sequence layer 320, the GOP layer 330, the picture layer 340, andthe slice layer 350 all begin with a start code that enables accessingof the media content from the storage device 273 (FIG. 2) at thebeginning of these substreams of the MPEG video stream. The sequencelayer 320 includes a sequence header (not shown) that includes suchinformation as picture rate, profile and level indication, image aspectratio, and interlace and progressive sequence indication. The sequenceheader is preferably after a start code, or more generally, is part ofthe compressed video stream as defined by the syntax and semantics ofthe compressed video format that is implemented. The headers (andextension to the headers) for the sequence layer 320, the GOP layer 330,and the picture layer 340 can also be used to carry filter or chromainformation from the downconverter 212 (FIG. 2) to the upconverter 227(FIG. 2), according to a preferred embodiment of the invention, anddescribed further below. The GOP layer 330 includes a group of I, P,and/or B pictures of varying order. The compression engine 217 arrangesthe frames in the bitstream such as to eliminate dependencies (e.g.,such that I pictures are not dependent on any other picture).

The picture layer 340 includes a series of slices that comprise a frame.The picture layer header (not shown) includes several parameters, suchas the picture type (e.g., I, P, etc.), a temporal reference thatindicates the position within the group of pictures with respect to theinitially transmitted signal, and a progressive or interlaced scanformat indication for the picture. The slice layer 350 includes a seriesof macroblocks that constitutes a subset of the picture. As is wellknown in the art, MPEG-2 divides the picture into areas calledmacroblocks, each representing a non-overlapping squared region of 16 by16 luma pixels. Different compression methodologies may employ differentcompression tools, different size blocks or macroblocks, and differentslice definitions. For instance, a slice in a compression methodologycould possibly span the whole picture or comprise of macroblocks thatare not adjacent in a sequential raster scan order.

In one implementation, the compression engine 217 (FIG. 2) is presentedpictures in 4:2:2 format at its input by the analog video decoder 216(FIG. 2). However, the analog video decoder 216 is typicallymanufactured to provide 4:2:2 formatted data for interlaced pictures, orin fields, to be presented to the output system 248 for output anddisplay on an interlaced TV. However, since most of the MPEG-2 Profilesuse a 4:2:0 color format, which generally involves the process in which,as described above, the chroma presented at the input to the compressionengine 217 is downsampled from 4:2:2 by a factor of two in the y axis.The compression engine 217 or a compression engine that produced a videostream received as a digital video channel from the headend 110 (FIG. 1)employs filters based on signal processing principles to convert to a4:2:0 representation of the 4:2:2 digitized video signal suitable forvideo compression. MPEG-2 video compression requires the chroma samplebe located at the edge between the left luma samples in every pair ofnon-overlapping consecutive rows, as explained below.

Consequently, downconversion filters in the compression engine 217 willperform the downconversion from 4:2:2 formatted pictures received at itsinput to the specified 4:2:0. The compression engine 217 or a remotecompression engine compresses pictures as progressive frame pictures orframes or as interlaced frame pictures (i.e., fields) according to itsprogrammed compression strategy (frame pictures, as is understood in theart, include picture elements (or pixels). Each picture element isspecified by the values of chroma and luma samples). For instance, acompression engine that detects that the interlaced frame picturepresented at its input was actually from a progressive camera or scannedfrom film may opt to compress the video signal as a progressive picture.

For compression of progressive frame pictures, the chroma downconversionfilters employed by one compression engine (e.g., a compression enginemanufactured by one manufacturer, or one model of a manufacturer) tendsto differ from those implemented by another compression engine (e.g., acompression engine of another manufacturer or of a different model bythe same manufacturer) according to their respective strategies thatcomprise the level of desired noise reduction, the target bit-rate forthe compressed video stream, compression mode (e.g., constant bit rate,variable bit rate, etc.), and/or whether downscaling of the picturespatial dimensions is effected. Consequently, chroma downconversionfilters differ among compression engines. Similarly, upconversionfilters may differ among decompression engines, such as due to pictureresizing requirements, color temperature differences, among otherreasons.

Current recommendations and/or international standards support thecoding of color sequences using 4:2:0 color formats. The recommendationsand/or international standards describe the coding of video thatincludes either progressive frame pictures or interlaced frame pictures,which may be mixed together in the same sequence. FIG. 3B is a schematicdiagram that illustrates an excerpt of the top-left corner of aprogressive frame picture showing the default vertical and horizontallocations of 4:2:0 luma and chroma samples in the spatial domain. The“X's” denote the locations of the luma samples, and the “O's” denote thelocations of the chroma samples. Half line and half column incrementsare shown to depict the position of the chroma samples. The image widthand height of the decoded luma memory arrays are preferably multiples of16 samples. The decoder output picture sizes that are not a multiple of16 in width or height can be specified using a cropping rectangle.

FIG. 3C illustrates the default location of chroma samples for the topfields 306 and bottom fields 307 of an interlaced frame picture in thespatial domain. The “X's” denote the locations of the luma samples, andthe “O's” denote the locations of the chroma samples. A frame of videoincludes two fields, the top field 306 and the bottom field 307, whichare interleaved. The first (i.e., top), third, fifth, etc. lines of aframe are the top field lines. The second, fourth, sixth, etc. lines ofa frame are the bottom field lines. A top field picture consists of onlythe top field lines of a frame. A bottom field picture consists of onlythe bottom field lines of a frame. The two fields of an interlaced frameare separated in time. They may be coded separately as two fieldpictures or together as a frame picture. A progressive frame should becoded as a single frame picture. However, a progressive frame is stillconsidered to include two fields (at the same instant in time) so thatother field pictures may reference the sub-fields of the frame.

The vertical sampling positions of the chroma samples in a top field 306of an interlaced frame are specified as shifted up by a ¼ luma sampleheight relative to the field-sampling grid in order for these samples toalign vertically to the usual position relative to the full-framesampling grid. The vertical sampling positions of the chroma samples ina bottom field 307 of an interlaced frame are specified as shifted downby ¼ luma sample height relative to the field-sampling grid in order forthese samples to align vertically to the usual position relative to thefull-frame sampling grid. The horizontal sampling positions of thechroma samples are specified as unaffected by the application ofinterlaced field coding.

Although the default and encouraged vertical and horizontal locations ofluma and chroma samples are as shown in FIGS. 3B and 3C, signaling ofoptional chroma locations in a group of pictures (GOP) Parameter Set ispossible. FIG. 4A shows an example GOP parameter set 405 using “pseudocode” for descriptive purposes. The GOP parameter set 405 can be storedin memory that serves a compression engine, such as compression enginememory 298 (FIG. 2), among other memory locations.

Chroma information in a compressed video stream can be specified by oneor more fields, each field of size equal to a finite number of bits.Without loss to the essence of the invention, a single or multiplefields in the compressed video stream may be employed to transport thechroma information.

As a decompression engine parses a compressed video stream, each fieldis interpreted according to the semantics and syntax of thespecification of the format of the compressed video stream. Withoutlimitation to the scope of the invention, a field in the compressedvideo stream may be a flag whose value is represented by the finitenumber of bits comprising the flag. A flag connotes information such asa property, attribute, or the absence or presence of a feature.Likewise, a field in the compressed video stream may represent data perthe value represented by its finite number of bits. A field in thecompressed video stream may represent a combination of one or more flagsand one or more data tokens.

Without limitation to the scope of the invention, a flag in thecompressed video stream is represented with a finite number of bits suchas a one-bit flag (1-bit) for exemplary purposes. Likewise, a data fieldis represented with a finite number of bits such as a two-bits flag(2-bit) for exemplary purposes. Likewise, the fields may be representedin the following description as a type of field such as an unsignednumber, expressed by the delimeter u( ), for exemplary purposes.

Without limitations to the scope of the invention, in the followingdescription, a name is associated with field for exemplary purposes. Forexample, chroma_loc_int is used to refer to a field but the actual namedoes not limit the scope of the invention. The actual name of a fieldmay be according to the specification of the syntax of the compressedvideo stream for a particular picture compression format.

A decompression engine may also opt to employ the same variable name asin the specification of the syntax of a compression format for the nameof the memory location or register where the decompression engine storesthe value of the respective field upon parsing the compressed videostream. A decompression engine may initialize the value of the variableto a default format during an initialization phase and/or prior to afirst instance of the respective field in the compressed video stream.

The chroma_(—)420_indicator is a one bit flag, u(1), in the GOPParameter Set 405, although in other embodiments can include a greateror fewer number of bits. The code numbers in parenthesis can take on thefollowing meanings:

-   -   Code_number=0: Default chroma location as specified in FIG. 3B        for a progressive frame picture or FIG. 3C for an interlaced        frame picture.    -   Code_number=1: Optional chroma location as specified by the        value of chroma_loc_prog for a progressive scan picture or        chroma_loc_int for an interlaced frame.        The chroma_loc_prog identifies an optional chroma location in a        progressive scan picture. It is a 2-bit field, u(2), transmitted        when chroma_(—)420_indicator=1 and progressive_structure=1,        although in other embodiments can include a greater or fewer        number of bits. Thus, for progressive frame pictures, an encoder        has the option to transmit one of the two alternate chroma        locations shown in option 0 frame picture 402 and option 1 frame        picture 404 in FIG. 4B by signaling the use of the optional        chroma location with a chroma_420_indicator value equal to 1.        FIG. 4B shows chroma locations for progressive pictures that are        optional to those shown for the progressive frame picture        illustrated in FIG. 3B. In FIG. 4B, the “X” denotes the location        of a luma sample, the “0” in the grid (i.e., that is not the 0        in row and column indices 0, 0.5, 1, etc.) denotes the location        of a chroma sample, and the “(1)” denotes that a chroma sample        is co-sited (i.e., co-located) with a luma sample. The optional        chroma location is specified by the value of chroma_loc_prog. A        decompression engine (and/or upconverter) and presentation        operation can ignore chroma_420_indicator and/or        chroma_loc_prog, for example to implement its own predetermined        chroma sampling scheme.

The chroma_loc_prog has the following meaning^(.)

-   -   Code_number=0: Optional chroma location in the progressive        picture as shown in the option 0 frame picture 402 of FIG. 4B.    -   Code_number=1: Optional chroma location in the progressive        picture as shown in the option 1 frame picture 404 of FIG. 4B.    -   Code_number=2: RESERVED    -   Code_number=3: RESERVED

Note that the “RESERVED” sections are for providing extensibility (e.g.,to add other options in the future).

For interlaced frame pictures, an encoder has the option to transmit oneof four pairs of optional chroma locations (i.e., optional from thoseshown as the default locations in FIG. 3C) formed from designatedlocations for chroma samples in the top and bottom fields. FIGS. 4C-4Dshow chroma locations for interlaced fields that are optional to thedefault locations shown in FIG. 3C. The encoder (e.g., compressionengine) signals the transmission of the optional chroma location with achroma_(—)420_indicator value equal to 1. The optional chroma locationis specified by the value of a field in the stream with size equal to afinite number of bits. As one example, the field may be referred to aschroma_loc_int in the specification of the syntax of the compressedvideo stream and a decompression engine may opt to name the variable ormemory location where it stores the value of the field. Thechroma_loc_int identifies optional chroma locations in an interlacedframe. For example, it is a 2-bit field, u(2), transmitted whenchroma_(—)420_indicator=1 and progressive_structure=0, although in otherembodiments it can include a greater or fewer number of bits.

The first three pairs of optional chroma samples (corresponding to codenumbers 0-3 described below) are formed from the locations shown in thetop field 406 and bottom field 407 of FIG. 4C. FIG. 4C illustrates theoptional chroma locations for the top field 406 and bottom field 407 ofan interlaced frame picture in the spatial domain. In FIG. 4C, “X”denotes the location of luma samples, the letters (other than “X”)denote the optional locations of chroma samples according to achroma_loc_int value, and the “( )” denotes that a chroma sample isco-sited with a luma sample. Valid pairs of chroma locations accordingto the value of chroma_loc_int are (B, L), (C, G) and (B, G). In otherwords, one way to view the interlaced frame pictures of FIG. 4C is toselect the luma samples (“X”) and one pair of chroma locations, ignoringthe other pairs. For example, selecting the (B, L) pair option, onechroma/luma sample configuration can be the understood by viewing thetop field 406 as including the luma samples located as shown by the“X's”, and the chroma samples located as shown by the letter “B” (andignoring the other letters). The bottom field 407 for the (B, L) pairoption can be understood by viewing the bottom field 407 as includingthe luma samples (“X”) as shown, and the chroma samples positioned asshown by the letter “L” (and ignoring the other letters). Note that forthe bottom field 407, the chroma samples are co-sited with some of theluma samples (as represented by the “(L)”).

As another example, the (C, G) pair option can be viewed in the topfield 406 as including the luma samples as shown (“X”'s), and the chromasamples represented by the letter “C”. Note that the chroma samples areco-sited with some of the luma samples (as represented by the “(C)”).Similarly, for the bottom field 407, the luma samples are positioned asshown by the “X′s” and the chroma samples are as shown by the letter “G”(and ignoring the other letters). A similar interpretation follows forthe (B, G) pair.

The chroma_loc_int has the following meaning

-   -   Code_number=0: (B, L) These chroma locations are representative        of subsampling top field from 4:2:2 with even number of taps and        bottom field with odd number of taps. Note that the number of        taps refers to the number of coefficients used in a filter. Taps        and filter placement effect a defined phase shift with respect        to a luma sample position, depending in part on how the filter        is applied to each respective line in a field or frame, and how        it is applied to each field (e.g., in the case of interlaced        frame pictures).    -   Code_number=1 (C, G) These chroma locations are representative        of subsampling top field from 4:2:2 with odd number of taps and        bottom field with even number of taps.    -   Code_number=2: (B, G) These chroma locations are representative        of subsampling top field from 4:2:2 with even number of taps and        bottom field with even number of taps.    -   Code_number=3 Chroma locations as shown in FIG. 4D,        representative of PAL DV (digital video) format. In the PAL DV        format, the chroma samples (CbCr) are not co-sited, unlike the        other formats, but are subsampled separately (as shown in FIG.        4D as a separate Cb and a separate Cr). FIG. 4D illustrates the        optional chroma locations for the top and bottom fields (408 and        409) of an interlaced picture in the spatial domain for PAL DV        when the chroma_loc_int=3. However, as indicated by the “(Cr)”        and “(Cb)”, they are each co-sited with some of the luma samples        (“X”).

In one embodiment, a decompression engine (and/or upconverter) andpresentation operation are allowed to ignore the chroma_(—)420_indicatorand/or the chroma_loc_int.

As it pertains to compression of 4:2:0 formatted data, the chromadownconversion filters employed by a first compression engine tends todiffer more significantly from those implemented by a second compressionengine than in comparison to when both, first and second compressionengine perform downconversion of the chroma for compression ofprogressive frame pictures. A first compression engine producing a firstcompression video stream may differ from a second compression engineproducing a second compression video stream for any of many possiblereasons. For instance, the two compression engines may be from distinctmanufacturers employing respective proprietary pre-processing schemes.Even when both compression engines are produced by the samemanufacturer, the pre-processing performed in the production of therespective compressed video streams may differ according to theemployment of different respective parameters to drive thepre-processing stage of the compression engine. For instance, parametersmay vary in the pre-processing stage according to the target bit ratedesired for the produced compressed video stream, and according to thecompression mode (constant bit rate or variable bit rate).

The difference extent can be appreciated by considering that some videocompression methodologies, such as MPEG-2 video, locate the chromasample at the edge of consecutive luma rows, or equivalently at a 0.5pixel offset in the vertical, as shown in FIG. 3C. However, the twoconsecutive rows of luma samples are from opposite fields in aninterlaced frame picture. That is, the chroma samples do not lievertically at the edge between the luma samples of the field. Thissuggests that a quarter pixel displacement (i.e., phase-shift) in thelocation of the chroma samples is necessary for placement betweenalternate luma rows comprising a field, or equivalently, a 0.5 pixelvertical displacement of the chroma sample in relation to the lumasamples when considering all the rows (or lines of the two fields) thatcomprise the frame. The quarter pixel displacement in the top field istoward the top and the quarter pixel displacement in the bottom field istoward the bottom. This is possibly born from the assumption thatinterlaced pictures were originally progressive. Thus, a compressionengine may opt to implement filters, that in addition to considerationfor noise reduction, target bit-rate, and downscaling, may impose afirst phase-shift in the chroma information in one type of field and adifferent or no phase-shift in the opposite field. Alternatively, nophase-shift may be imposed at all.

Regardless of what filtering strategy is employed during chromadownconversion by the compression engine, a compression engine caninclude auxiliary information in one or more of the layers of thecompressed video sequence hierarchy (e.g., GOP and supplementaryenhancement information layer) to specify the offsets of the chromasamples or the filters to the decompression engine so that thedecompression engine (i.e., the upconverter of the decompression engine)can perform optimized filtering for upconversion of the chroma. Ineffect, the color signal component (i.e., the chroma) of the videosignal will be downconverted at the downconverter 212 (FIG. 2) from the4:2:2 color format to the 4:2:0 color format. Filters are preferablyused by the downconverter 212 to make up for the loss of colorinformation in the downconversion (i.e., by spreading the colorcomponent over the vertical direction of the pixel sample using weightedcoefficients according to signal processing principles).

A problem can occur at the upconversion stage, wherein the upconverter227 of the decompression engine 222 recreates the 4:2:2 color formatfrom the 4:2:0 color format. Typically, a generalized filter is used toreconstruct the color information of the picture (and thus reconstructthe chroma values for each pixel), which results in some degradation(e.g., loss of color fidelity in fine objects and jaggedness in certaincolors) of the picture quality. In a preferred embodiment, theinterpolation and subsequent color information reconstruction processcan be improved by the downconverter 212 (FIG. 2) (or a similardownconverter in a remote compression engine) communicating to theupconverter 227 (FIG. 2) of the decompression engine 222 (FIG. 2) thefilter or chroma offset needed for upconverting from 4:2:0 to 4:2:2.This communication of information such as a filter or chroma offsetinformation is herein understood to include transmission of theinformation regardless of whether it is intended that compression isbeing effected for storage purposes or for transmission over atransmission channel.

FIGS. 5-8 are flow diagrams that illustrate example methods forcommunicating the filter or the chroma information (e.g., chroma offset)from the downconverter 212 to the upconverter 227. In the embodiments ofFIGS. 5-8, the filter or chroma offset can be stored either in theheader or as an extension to the header, or as a separate field for theparticular video stream layer. FIG. 5 includes the steps ofdownconverting the video signal from a 4:2:2 format to a 4:2:0 format(step 510), incorporating the filter information (or chroma offset) inthe sequence layer of the video signal (step 520), and forwarding thevideo signal for storage or further processing (step 530). As is truefor FIGS. 5-8, storage can include compression engine memory 298 (FIG.2), decompression engine memory 299 (FIG. 2), memory 249 (FIG. 2) or thestorage device 273 (FIG. 2) or other repositories in the DHCT 200, orsimilar components in other devices. Alternatively, for the benefit of aself-contained system as described above, the filter or offsetinformation may be included with data annotations included in a separatefile and stored in the storage device 273. In such an embodiment, thedriver 211 (FIG. 2) interprets the separate file and sets the filters.The separate file is useful when the decompression engine 222 “knows”that the file exists and can make sense of the retained information.

Further processing, as indicated in step 530, can include transmittingthe compressed video stream with the respective chroma information orfilter required for optimized conversion over a transmission channelwhen the compression is effected by a remote compression engine, as isalso true for the use of the phrase “further processing” for FIGS. 6-8.FIG. 6 is another embodiment that includes the steps of downconvertingthe video signal 610, incorporating the filter or chroma offset in theGOP layer of the video signal 620, and forwarding the video signal forstorage or further processing (step 630). FIG. 7 illustrates anotherembodiment, wherein the steps include downconverting the video signal710, incorporating the filter or offset information in the picture layerof the video signal 720, and forwarding the video signal for storage orfurther processing (step 730).

Another embodiment is illustrated in FIG. 8, and includes the steps ofdownconverting the video signal 810 and sending the filter or offsetinformation as auxiliary data for storage (e.g., in storage device 273,FIG. 2) (step 820), or sending to another location for furtherprocessing, such as transmitting it over a transmission channel whencompression is effected by a remote compression engine. The filterinformation can be stored with the annotated data file such as the filethat includes the program information table 203 (FIG. 2) or the indextable 202 (FIG. 2) of the storage device 273. Alternatively, the filterinformation can be encoded as private data and associated with the videocompressed stream. Alternatively, the filter information can be encodedas user data as part of the extensions permitted by the video syntax andsemantics of the compressed video methodology. In the process ofdisplaying the video signal, the upconverter 227 (FIG. 2), incommunication with the device driver 211 (FIG. 2), can read thisinformation from the program information table 203 and set the optimalupconversion filter. In other embodiments, the upconverter 227 can readthe header or extension of the sequence layer, GOP layer, or picturelayer to evaluate the filter information for optimum upconversion. Notealso that in the self-contained system described above, thedecompression engine 222 (or subcomponents thereof) can use the absenceof the filter or chroma offset as a flag that upconversion is notrequired due to the fact, for example, that the video stream is beingtransmitted directly from a transmitted signal from the headend 110(FIG. 1) without requiring upconversion (e.g., in the event an MPEGdigital transport stream was sent from the headed 110). Further, in someembodiments, the filter information can also be transmitted as stuffingpackets, as would be appreciated, in the context of the preferredembodiments described above, by those skilled in the art.

In an alternate embodiment, the chroma offsets relative to the lumasamples are specified regardless of which downconversion filters wereemployed to generate the 4:2:0 downconversion and regardless of whetherdownconversion from 4:2:2 to 4:2:0 was performed at all. For instance,downconversion to 4:2:0 may not be performed at all when the digitizedvideo signal presented at the input of the compression engine 217 (FIG.2) is already in 4:2:0 format. A digitized video signal may already bein 4:2:0 color format for any of multiple reasons.

A video signal compressed a priori with a first video compression methodresults in a first compressed video stream representation of the videosignal. The first compressed video stream comprises of compressedpictures in a first 4:2:0 color format that signifies a first chromaoffset relative to the luma samples according to the specified chromaoffset by a first set of syntax and semantics rules in the first videocompression method. A second video compression method specifies thatvideo signals be compressed according to a second set of syntax andsemantics rules comprising a second 4:2:0 color format that signifies asecond chroma offset relative to the luma samples.

In one embodiment, conversion from the video signal compressed with thefirst video compression method to a video signal compressed with thesecond video compression method is effected at headend 110 (FIG. 1) fortransmission via network 130 (FIG. 1) and reception by DHCT 200 (FIG.2). A decompression engine (not shown) in the headend 110 capable ofdecompressing the first compressed video stream decompresses the firstcompressed video stream and the decompressed and reconstructed picturesare then presented to the input of a second compression engine (notshown) in the headend 110 to produce the compressed video stream versioncorresponding to the second compression method. The second compressionengine in the headend 110 retains the first 4:2:0 color format andincludes information in the compressed video stream (following thesecond compression engine) that specifies the first 4:2:0 color formatalthough the compressed video stream is a second compressed videostream. In essence, a conversion, or equivalently a transcodingoperation, is performed from a first to a second compressed video streamrepresentation and the first 4:2:0 color format is retained while thesecond 4:2:0 color format native to the second compression method isbypassed. After reception by the DHCT 200, the information specifyingthe chroma offset relative to the luma samples is provided to theupconverter 227 (FIG. 2) to perform the proper chroma upconversion. Theupconverter 227 performs the chroma upconversion according to the first4:2:0 color format rather than according to the second 4:2:0 colorformat and thus picture quality degradation in this implementation isavoided.

Therefore, video compressed streams corresponding to the secondcompressed video method are received in the DHCT 200 (FIG. 2) via thenetwork 130 (FIG. 1) from the headend 110 (FIG. 1). Information in thecompressed video stream specifies either the first or second 4:2:0 colorformat. The decompression engine 222 is capable of decompressing thecompressed video stream compressed with the second compressed videomethod. The decompression engine 222 (FIG. 2) decompresses a videocompressed stream and the respective 4:2:0 color format received in thecompressed video stream is provided to the upconverter 227 to performproper chroma upconversion. The upconverter 227 performs the chromaupconversion according to the specified 4:2:0 color format.

In an alternate embodiment, a decompression engine in the headend 110(FIG. 1) does not effect full reconstruction of the compressed videosignal but decompresses the compressed pictures in the first videocompressed stream to a sufficient extent to convert them to a compressedvideo stream representative of the second video compression method. Thecompression engine in the headend 110 and the decompression engine inthe headend 110 may be executing in the same physical computing deviceas different processes. Thus, the compression engine (e.g., a secondcompression engine at the headend 110) does not receive a fullyreconstructed digitized video signal at its input but informationcorresponding to a partially but sufficiently decompressed video signalthat represents an intermediate representation of the video signal thatcan be converted and compressed with the second video compressionmethod.

In another alternate embodiment, video compressed streams in formatsrepresentative of the first and second compression video methods arereceived in the DHCT 200 (FIG. 2) via the network 130 (FIG. 1) from theheadend 110 (FIG. 1). The decompression engine 222 (FIG. 2) is capableof decompressing video compressed streams, each compressed either withthe first or second compressed video method. A compressed video streamaccording to a first video compression method is capable of includingspecifying information corresponding to a first or a second 4:2:0 colorformat. A compressed video stream according to a second videocompression method is also capable of including specifying informationcorresponding to a first or a second 4:2:0 color format. Thedecompression engine 222 decompresses a video compressed streamaccording to its compressed format, and the respective 4:2:0 colorformat received in the compressed video stream is provided to theupconverter 227 (FIG. 2) to perform proper chroma upconversion. Theupconverter 227 performs the chroma upconversion according to thespecified 4:2:0 color format and/or the type of display device that itis driving.

The filter information or chroma information (e.g., chroma offset) canbe embodied in many different forms. In one embodiment, a flag as smallas one-bit can be part of the parameter set of the compressed videostream to notify a decompression engine that chroma or filterinformation (e.g., filter sets, offsets, etc.) is to be employed by thedecompression engine for upconversion. No aggregate information istransmitted in the parameter set when the flag is inactive (ordisabled). When the flag is enabled, aggregate information that informsthe decompression engine of which filters to employ (or which offsets toaccomplish) for upconversion is transmitted in the parameter set. Theaggregate information may be as small as four bits (or a nibble) tospecify one of sixteen (or fewer or more) possible sets of filters thatalready reside at the decompression engine's internal memory, circuit,and/or accessible external memory. Alternatively, a byte rather than anibble can be employed to specify one of sixteen possible sets offilters for the top field and another for the bottom field. Yet anotheralternative is that the byte specifies a set of filters implied (e.g.,implied by the chroma offset) for both type of fields.

The flag and the indexing field to be included in the parameter set thatspecifies information pertaining to which set of filters to use in theupconversion of chroma can be transmitted as part of the header of thepicture sequence level, as a sequence extension, in the group ofpictures layer, as part of the picture header or picture codingextension, as part of picture display extension, as part of the slicelayer, as MPEG-2 private data and/or as user data.

An element specified to carry data or a parameter set in thehierarchical syntax of the video compression stream can serve as avehicle to carry the chroma information or the minimum sufficientinformation required to signal to the decompression engine that it isrequired to implement an optimized chroma upconversion operation, suchas a particular chroma offset. Signaling of chroma information with aminimum sized field serving as a flag thus consumes little overhead. Inone embodiment, it is mandatory for a decompression engine to implementchroma upconversion when the flag is active. In an alternate embodiment,it is optional for a decompression engine to implement chromaupconversion when the flag is active.

Information related to chroma upconversion is transmitted at a definedperiodicity. In one embodiment it is transmitted every half a second,and on another, every second. In yet another embodiment, the periodicityis determined by the established frequency of transmission for theparameter set that serves as the vehicle to carry the chromainformation. In another embodiment, the activation flag is transmittedmore frequently than the information that specifies the optimal filterfor upconversion. The activation flag in such a case comprises asufficient number of bits to signal at least one of three differentstates: active and no immediate transmission of information, active andimmediate transmission of information, and not active (disabled).

FIGS. 9A-9F are schematic diagrams that illustrate several embodimentsof the filter information as it is transferred from the downconverter212 to the upconverter 227. Although filter information will bedescribed as being transferred in FIGS. 9A-9F, the transfer of chromainformation (e.g., chroma offsets) can similarly apply. Note that forinterlaced fields, the upconversion filter may or may not be differentbetween the odd field and the even field. Also note that one or more ofthese implementations described below can be applied independently, orin combination to perform the upconversion of the 4:2:0 video signal.FIG. 9A shows some general interactions between the downconverter 212and the upconverter 227. There may be an intermediary component thatreceives the information in some embodiments before passing it along tothe upconverter 227, such as the compression engine memory 298 (FIG. 2),the decompression engine memory 299 (FIG. 2), the storage device 273(FIG. 2), or memory 249 (FIG. 2), among other components or devices, orcombinations thereof. It will be understood, in the context of the abovedescription, that other components of the DHCT 200 (FIG. 2) can beemployed in the described interactions, including the signal processingsystem 214 (FIG. 2), the device driver 211 (FIG. 2), the processor 244(FIG. 2), memory 249 (and other memory not shown), among othercomponents.

FIG. 9A depicts an implementation wherein the downconverter 212 forwardsthe upconverting filter to be used by the upconverter 227 forupconverting the 4:2:0 video signal. In this implementation, thedownconverter 212 “knows” what filter it used for downconverting thevideo signal, and thus performs the closest inverse calculation todetermine the optimal complement filter for use by the upconverter 227in upconversion. In other embodiments, the downconverter 212 can use alook up table located locally in the compression engine memory 298 (FIG.2), or in other memory, to determine the optimal filter for upconversionbased on the filter the downconverter 212 used for downconversion.Alternatively, this inverse functionality can be processed by aprocessor under the direction of the compression engine 217 (FIG. 2) orsubcomponents thereof in accordance to whether the DHCT 200 (FIG. 2) isdriving an interlaced or a progressive TV. Upon receipt of the filterinformation by the upconverter 227 (e.g., via retrieval from thecompression engine memory 298, the decompression engine memory 299 (FIG.2), the storage device 273 (FIG. 2) or memory 249 (FIG. 2), etc., ordirect from the downconverter 212) the upconverter 227 can implementthis filter for upconversion.

FIG. 9B depicts another embodiment of the filter information. As shown,the filter information can be embodied as the downconversion filter usedby the downconverter 212. The upconverter 227, upon receipt of thisdownconversion filter, would perform an inverse procedure to arrive atthe optimal downconversion filter. The upconverter 227 could performthis internally, or in cooperation with other decompression enginesubcomponents or other DHCT elements.

FIG. 9C is a schematic diagram of another implementation of the filterinformation. The downconverter 212, after downconverting, could storethe filter used for downconverting, or the filter to be used forupconverting, in one of many various storage locations in the DHCT 200(FIG. 2). For example, the downconverter 212 can cause the upconversionand/or downconversion filter to be stored in the storage device 273under a particular file, or in system memory 249 in one or moreregisters, or in compression engine memory 298 (FIG. 2) or in thedecompression engine memory 299 (FIG. 2). Then, the filter informationwould include an address or location (or filename) where the upconverter227 can access the upconversion filter (or downconversion filter, andthen perform an inverse operation as described in association with FIG.9B) and apply to upconvert the video signal.

FIGS. 9D-9F illustrate several embodiments using a data table and anindex to the data table. The data table can comprise a suite of filters(or chroma offsets) that can include the filters used fordownconversion, the filters to be used for upconversion, or acombination of the two. In some implementations, the filters can bestandardized in a video compression standard such as the draft H.26L.For example, FIG. 9D illustrates an implementation where the tableincludes the upconversion filters to be used by the upconverter 227. Inthis implementation, the table is sent by the downconverter 212, as wellas an index to the proper upconversion filter to use. Transmission offilter information by a video compression methodology or standard wouldnot limit employment of chroma upconversion optimization to aself-contained system with a storage device but would more widely permittransmission of digitally compressed video channels that carry thefilter information (or chroma offset) in the compressed video stream aspart of its semantics as syntax.

FIG. 9E illustrates an implementation where the table includes theupconversion filters and the downconversion filters, and it is sent bythe downconverter 212 as well as an index as to what downconversonfilter was used. In this implementation, the upconverter 227 treats thistable as a look up table and selects the appropriate upconversionfilter, or alternatively the appropriate chroma offsets based on theindex to the downconversion filter used. Alternatively, the data tablecan include just the downconversion filter used along with an index tothe filter used, and the upconverter 227 will perform the proper inversefunction (or other devices will perform alone or in cooperation with thedecompression engine subcomponents) to determine the optimalupconversion filter to use.

FIG. 9F illustrates an implementation where the table is available forready disposition at the upconverter 227, for example in thedecompression engine memory 299 (FIG. 2) or at a known (known by thecompression engine 217 (FIG. 2) and the decompression engine 222)addressable location for the decompression engine 222. In thisimplementation, the downconverter 212 sends the index number to thetable, where the index number can indicate the upconversion filter (orchroma offset) to use, or in other embodiments, the downconversionfilter used (and thus the upconverter 227 would perform the properinverse function to determine the optimal upconversion filter).

FIG. 10 is another schematic diagram that illustrates anotherembodiment, described previously, for informing the upconverter 227 asto how to sample the chroma information. As shown, the downconverter 212can send a chroma offset, as explained in association with FIGS. 4A-4D.The upconverter 227, upon receipt of this information, can implement theappropriate filter to effect this offset.

Note that the preferred embodiments are not limited to DHCT deviceslocated in a network. The preferred embodiments can be employed inconsumer devices, such as digital video disc (DVD) players, or otherelectronic devices or systems that have co-locatedupconversion/downconversion functionality. Further, one or morecomponents of the preferred embodiments can be co-located in a singledevice, such as a single semiconductor chip or in a single DHCT, or inother embodiments, can be distributed among several components withinthe DHCT or among one or more other embedded devices in addition toand/or in lieu of the DHCT. For example, a compressed video streamand/or a decompressed video stream can be resident or deposited inmemory 249 (FIG. 2) or other memory in the DHCT 16 due to compressionand/or decompression functionality implemented externally to the DHCT 16and loaded into memory via other mechanisms, such as via thecommunication ports 274 or via a memory card (not shown), to mention afew examples of many. As another example, in some embodiments, thechroma information and the filter information can be transmitted betweencompression and decompression engines that are co-located within asingle embedded device or distributed among several embedded devices.

The compression engine 217, pre-processor 213, downconverter 212,decompression engine 222, video decompressor 223, and the upconverter227 (FIG. 2) can be implemented in hardware, software, firmware, or acombination thereof. In the preferred embodiment(s), the compressionengine 217, pre-processor 213, downconverter 212, decompression engine222, video decompressor 223, and the upconverter 227 are implemented ina digital signal processor or media processor device capable ofexecuting media instructions such as multiply-and-accumulate.Multiplication would result in multiple multiplication of chroma valuesin parallel and their collective products added. In an alternateembodiment, the downconverter and upconverter are preferably implementedin dedicated circuitry that retain filter tap values in registers andimplements multiplication for corresponding pixel values at the samelocation of multiple lines in a systematic pipelined fashion.Alternatively, software and firmware that is stored in a memory and thatis executed by a suitable instruction execution system is employed toeffect the downconversion and upconversion operations. If implemented inhardware, as in an alternative embodiment, the compression engine 217,pre-processor 213, downconverter 212, decompression engine 222, videodecompressor 223, and the upconverter 227 may be implemented with any ora combination of the following technologies, which are all well known inthe art: a discrete logic circuit(s) having logic gates for implementinglogic functions upon data signals, an application specific integratedcircuit (ASIC) having appropriate combinational logic gates, aprogrammable gate array(s) (PGA), a field programmable gate array(FPGA), etc.

Filters implemented in hardware or software may comprise poly-phasefilters, each of multiple taps to attain a certain filtering precisionand accuracy, and such filters may fulfill multiple objectivessimultaneously, including noise reduction and picture dimensiondownscaling. The filter values may vary according to a compressionengine's encoding strategy for different target bit rates. Poly-phasefilter implementation can cause filter tap values to be updated fromline to line according to the number of phases employed.

A downconversion or upconversion filter implementation can beimplemented by performing filtering first and sampling of informationimmediately after processing of a prespecified amount of video data(e.g., on every line).

The compression engine 217, pre-processor 213, downconverter 212,decompression engine 222, video decompressor 223, and the upconverter227 (FIG. 2), which can comprise an ordered listing of executableinstructions for implementing logical functions, can be embodied in anycomputer-readable medium for use by or in connection with an instructionexecution system, apparatus, or device, such as a computer-based system,processor-containing system, or other system that can fetch theinstructions from the instruction execution system, apparatus, or deviceand execute the instructions. In the context of this document, a“computer-readable medium” can be any means that can contain, store,communicate, propagate, or transport the program for use by or inconnection with the instruction execution system, apparatus, or device.The computer readable medium can be, for example but not limited to, anelectronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic, infrared, orsemiconductor system, apparatus, device, or propagation medium. Morespecific examples (a nonexhaustive list) of the computer-readable mediumwould include the following: an electrical connection (electronic)having one or more wires, a portable computer diskette (magnetic), arandom access memory (RAM) (electronic), a read-only memory (ROM)(electronic), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or Flashmemory) (electronic), an optical fiber (optical), and a portable compactdisc read-only memory (CDROM) (optical). Note that the computer-readablemedium could even be paper or another suitable medium upon which theprogram is printed, as the program can be electronically captured, viafor instance optical scanning of the paper or other medium, thencompiled, interpreted or otherwise processed in a suitable manner ifnecessary, and then stored in a computer memory.

Any process descriptions or blocks in flow charts should be understoodas representing modules, segments, or portions of code which include oneor more executable instructions for implementing specific logicalfunctions or steps in the process, and alternate implementations areincluded within the scope of the preferred embodiment of the presentinvention in which functions may be executed out of order from thatshown or discussed, including substantially concurrently or in reverseorder, depending on the functionality involved, as would be understoodby those reasonably skilled in the art of the present invention.

It should be emphasized that the above-described embodiments of thepresent invention, particularly, any “preferred embodiments” are merelypossible examples of implementations, merely setting forth a clearunderstanding of the principles of the inventions. Many variations andmodifications may be made to the above-described embodiments of theinvention without departing substantially from the spirit of theprinciples of the invention. All such modifications and variations areintended to be included herein within the scope of the disclosure andpresent invention and protected by the following claims.

Therefore, having thus described the invention, at least the followingis claimed:
 1. A method for signaling chroma information for a picturein a compressed video stream, said method comprising the steps of:providing a compressed video stream that includes a picture havingchroma samples and luma samples; and providing in said compressed videostream a flag for signaling information corresponding to the location ofthe chroma samples in relation to the luma samples in the picture,wherein a first defined flag value indicates default locations of thechroma samples in relation to the luma samples in the picture, andwherein a second defined flag value indicates a presence in thecompressed video stream of auxiliary chroma information corresponding torelative locations of the chroma samples to the luma samples in thepicture.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the number of chroma samplesin the picture implied by the first defined flag value is equal to thenumber of chroma samples in the picture implied by the second definedflag value.
 3. The method of claim 2, wherein a first value of theauxiliary chroma information is defined to correspond to relativelocations of the chroma samples that are different than the defaultlocations of the chroma samples in relation to the luma samples in thepicture.
 4. The method of claim 2, wherein the step of providing theflag in the compressed video stream comprises the step of providing aone-bit flag.
 5. The method of claim 4, wherein the step of providingthe one-bit flag in the compressed video stream comprises the step ofproviding the one-bit flag having the first defined flag value.
 6. Themethod of claim 5, further including the step of transmitting thecompressed video stream with the one-bit flag having the first definedflag value.
 7. The method of claim 5, further including the steps of:providing a second compressed video stream different than the compressedvideo stream, said second compressed video stream including a secondpicture having chroma samples and luma samples; providing in the secondcompressed video stream a second flag for signaling informationcorresponding to the location of the chroma samples in relation to theluma samples in the second picture, said provided second flag having thesecond defined flag value; and providing in the second compressed videostream a second auxiliary chroma information, said provided secondauxiliary chroma information having a value that corresponds to relativelocations of the chroma samples that are different than the defaultlocations of the chroma samples in relation to the luma samples in thesecond picture.
 8. The method of claim 4, further including the step ofproviding the auxiliary chroma information in the compressed videostream, and wherein the step of providing the one-bit flag in thecompressed video stream comprises the step of providing the one-bit flaghaving the second defined flag value.
 9. The method of claim 8, furtherincluding the step of transmitting the compressed video stream with theone-bit flag having the second defined flag value and the auxiliarychroma information in the compressed video stream.
 10. The method ofclaim 9, wherein a first value of the auxiliary chroma information inthe compressed video stream corresponds to relative locations of thechroma samples that are different than the default locations of thechroma samples in relation to the luma samples in the picture.
 11. Themethod of claim 1, wherein a first value of the auxiliary chromainformation is defined to correspond to relative locations of the chromasamples that are different than the default locations of the chromasamples in relation to the luma samples in the picture.
 12. The methodof claim 2, further including the step of providing in the compressedvideo stream a plurality of instances of a parameter set associated withthe picture, each instance of said parameter set in the compressed videostream including the flag for signaling information corresponding to thelocation of the chroma samples in relation to the luma samples in thepicture.
 13. The method of claim 1, wherein the auxiliary chromainformation further corresponds to first and second locations of thechroma samples in relation to the luma samples in the picture, saidfirst relative locations of the chroma samples corresponding to a topfield of the picture, and said second relative locations of the chromasamples corresponding to a bottom field of the picture.
 14. The methodof claim 13, further including the step of providing in the compressedvideo stream a plurality of instances of a parameter set associated withthe picture, each instance of said parameter set in the providedcompressed video stream including the flag for signaling informationcorresponding to the location of the chroma samples in relation to theluma samples in the picture.
 15. A method for processing signaled chromainformation in a compressed video stream, said method comprising thesteps of: receiving a compressed video stream that includes a picturehaving chroma samples and luma samples; and receiving in said compressedvideo stream a flag for signaling information corresponding to thelocation of the chroma samples in relation to the luma samples in thepicture, wherein a first defined flag value indicates default locationsof the chroma samples in relation to the luma samples in the picture,and wherein a second defined flag value indicates a presence in thecompressed video stream of auxiliary chroma information corresponding torelative locations of the chroma samples to the luma samples in thepicture.
 16. The method of claim 15, wherein the number of chromasamples in the picture implied by the first defined flag value is equalto the number of chroma samples in the picture implied by the seconddefined flag value.
 17. The method of claim 16, wherein the step ofreceiving the flag in the compressed video stream comprises the step ofreceiving a one-bit flag.
 18. The method of claim 17, wherein the stepof receiving the one-bit flag in the compressed video stream comprisesthe step of receiving the one-bit flag having the first defined flagvalue.
 19. The method of claim 18, further including the steps of:receiving a second compressed video stream different than the compressedvideo stream, said second compressed video stream including a secondpicture having chroma samples and luma samples; receiving in the secondcompressed video stream a second flag for signaling informationcorresponding to the location of the chroma samples in relation to theluma samples in the second picture, said received second flag having thesecond defined flag value; and receiving in the second compressed videostream a second auxiliary chroma information, said received secondauxiliary chroma information having a value that corresponds to relativelocations of the chroma samples that are different than the defaultlocations of the chroma samples in relation to the luma samples in thesecond picture.
 20. A system for signaling chroma information for apicture in a compressed video stream, said system comprising: a memorywith logic; and a processor configured with the logic to: provide acompressed video stream that includes a picture having chroma samplesand luma samples; and provide in said compressed video stream a flag forsignaling information corresponding to the location of the chromasamples in relation to the luma samples in the picture, wherein a firstdefined flag value indicates default locations of the chroma samples inrelation to the luma samples in the picture, wherein a second definedflag value indicates a presence in the compressed video stream ofauxiliary chroma information corresponding to relative locations of thechroma samples to the luma samples in the picture, and wherein thenumber of chroma samples in the picture implied by the first definedflag value is equal to the number of chroma samples in the pictureimplied by the second defined flag value.